Why mathematicians ignore holidays: Oct 31 = Dec 25.

2002.11.30

Here's a picture of my niece Emma and the scarf I made her from a ball of Crystal Palace Splash. She gets extremely happy and silly when she's wearing it.
Otherwise, I've spent the long weekend spinning musket Shetland - almost three full bobbins now - and knitting a pair of socks for my mother in (yuck) commercial sock yarn. I should weave, but haven't been in the mood.

2002.11.28

2002.11.27

This is a doll hat made with handspun leftovers. I'm giving the doll to my niece for Christmas, but since she strips all her dolls nekkid, I don't see much point in making a sweater :)
Making the hat reminds me of my grandmother, who taught me to knit when I was six. She used to knit doll clothing out of her scraps without patterns, and I really think this is why I branched out so quickly into doing my own designs: I had concrete evidence from day one that patterns are unnecessary if you have a brain.
And the amazing exploding box of dog hair arrived at Fantasy Fibers today, although not with generating an exception. Apparently UPS didn't know that the road recently got an official name and marked it as "recipient moved". Sigh.
Happy Thanksgiving and safe travel to all those celebrating!

2002.11.25

The 80/20 silk/linen blend from Webs arrived today. It's a very interesting yarn, a noil and tow blend that's slightly textured. I expect that it will wash up to be quite soft. Thankfully, I have the long weekend (Thanksgiving is my complete anti-social holiday - I go absolutely nowhere!) to try a scarf warp.
Webs also threw in a mouse pad with their logo - a sheepie! That will definitely go to work for one of the three computers there.

We had a spinning accident last night. Poor Bear walked too close to the wheel and got his coat wound around the footman. I had to cut him out. The chopped coat isn't too noticeable, especially compared to the three shaved patches of varying size from his surgery, but it took tweezers to get all the hair out of the wheel!

2002.11.23

The qiviut wimple is done, although I still need to wash and block it. It's for a friend of my mother, whose husband apparently just got laid off. Let's hope this warms her spirits.
Now I'm back to spinning the musket and contemplating a sock design.

2002.11.21

The amazing expanding box is en route. I'm following its tracking number closely - is there a UPS code for "exploded in transit", I wonder?
Today, a co-worker asked me for help on a sweater she's knitting. It's the first one she's ever done, and she was having trouble with the directions. Definitely not her fault, since they weren't particularly clear. The best part was when I pulled the work off the needles and ripped. Her eyes got huge, and she just gasped :) I didn't care for the pattern, though. The neckline stitches were all bound off, even though there is going to be a collar. Why not leave the back neck stitches live? Ick.
Last night, I picked up all the provisional cast on stitches on the wimple, and I'm making progress on that edge now. It's a bit tedious, but it makes such a difference in the finished edges to knit on the border. I also no longer do a one-to-one match when knitting off the edge stitches because I find that ruffles. Instead I knit off 5 to 4, or in this case 6 to 5 because it fits the pattern repeat.
And ooh - yesterday I got an email from Webs with a silk closeout that will go in the next mailing. I ordered four cones of the 80% silk/20% linen blend, which will be great for weaving or lace knitting. Since I'm in the same UPS zone as Webs, I might have it tomorrow.

2002.11.20

Step right up and see the amazing, expanding box-o-fiber! Last night I vacuum-packed the Keeshond and wool mix and sealed it into the box. But there was apparently a pinhole in one or both of the plastic bags, and the box rose overnight like a loaf of bread. I have applied two rounds of filament strapping tape to keep it all from exploding in transit and will ship as soon as UPS opens. On their heads (or trucks) be it!

2002.11.18

Holy guano, Batman! I got two boxes of Keeshond today from friends, which I just added to the total and compressed into a bag for shipping. It weighs 6.5 pounds! I guess a little loss in the dehairing process isn't going to mean much.

Got the latest issue of Knitters today - celebrating "Glorious Garter". How nauseating! At least I conveniently recycled the renewal notice ...
On a brighter note, I have finished the body of the wimple and now am knitting on the edgings. Will I finish it by tonight? Probably not, but the end is in sight.

2002.11.16

Ta-da! The smallest bump of musket is now one bobbin of singles. That's probably about 6 ounces or a tad more.
Spinning and reading are about all I can manage at the moment. I've gotten my annual November cold and just don't feel like focusing on the wimple or the rugs on the loom.

The USPS came through with the Shetland wool! The three bumps in the lower left are the light gray, while the other three are the musket. I'm pleased with the way the musket blended to a light, sort of cinnamon-y brown. It should look very nice, and slightly darker, spun up.
There's about 1.75 pounds of gray and 1.5 pounds of musket. I'll spin it into a three-ply, which makes nifty socks, but will also be nice for woven blankets. I have a vague plan to pull out all the natural Shetland handspun to see what kind of blanket I could weave.

2002.11.07

Success, finally, in a frustrating time at work - I was trying to install OS X on my video editing Mac, and it just wouldn't recognize any disks. So if you're trying to do this as well, here's some hints. First disconnect all USB devices except the keyboard and mouse. Disconnect all firewire devices and SCSI devices. If you have SCSI and you're still having trouble, remove the SCSI card. What a royal (and largely undocumented) pain!
The silly scarf is finished. Fat needles and fuzzy yarn are not my favorites, but it's cute for a four year old. So I'm back to the wimple, despite a large bandage on one finger (bread slicing incident!).